'Breaking Bad's' return gets best ratings ever

The mid-season premiere of "Breaking Bad" -- a.k.a., the first episode of the final eight -- made history.

Author:
kjac

Published:
6:20 AM CDT August 20, 2013

By Breeanna Hare

The mid-season premiere of "Breaking Bad" -- a.k.a., the first episode of the final eight -- made history.

Not only was it an amazingly revealing installment, but it was also the most-watched "Breaking Bad" entry since the show's debut on AMC in 2008. (If you are one of the few who didn't tune in, stop reading now -- there are spoilers below.)

Nearly 6 million viewers (5.9 million, to be exact) watched the series' return, according to AMC. That's a 102 percent increase over last summer's season five premiere. (You all have been binge-watching, haven't you?)

And according to creator Vince Gilligan, the next seven episodes will be just as rich as this weekend's installment.

To hear Gilligan tell it, he and his writers are sitting on a wealth of story, and that's part of the reason why they swiftly brought in Hank and Walt's shocking confrontation in the first episode back.

"(W)e've got a s***load of story left to tell. And we've only got seven more episodes after this one in which to tell it," Gilligan told the Daily Beast. "So we'd better make hay while the sun is shining."

The final eight episodes, he continued, will "move faster than any stretch of eight episodes that we've ever had in the history of the show. Once this thing gets going, and it gets going very quickly, as you've seen, it just rolls along like gangbusters. It has to because we've got so little time left."

Strap in -- this is going to be a fun (and apparently greatly watched) ride.